Wednesday, April 23, 2008

So about a week ago I went on an Amazon.com buying spree and bought a TON of cookbooks as well as some novels for my reading pleasure. The first two cookbooks that I bought were The New Moosewood Cookbook and Moosewood Restaurant Cooks At Home both by the wonderful Mollie Katzen.

The New Moosewood Cookbook is both cute, visually interesting and has awesome recipes! There is so much that I am excited about making in this book! Make sure if you buy it you get the NEW version because Katzen has cut down on a lot of the fat in the recipes but kept the flavor. Almost all of the recipes are vegetarian and most are easy to veganize.

I also bought Moosewood Restaurant Cooks At Home and made the Red Lentil Soup that's featured in it. It was quick and easy and really flavorful. I've been babysitting everyday this week and packing the lentil soup for lunch each day. I don't have any pictures yet because I've only eaten it out of a tupperware container but maybe tomorrow I'll snap a pic.

Mollie Katzen is a great cook and a pioneer of mainstreaming vegetarian cooking. She also has a great website: Molliekatzen.com where she lists tons of recipes and cooking tips!

When I got back from babysitting tonight I knew exactly what I wanted for dinner: Salade Nicoise. Though my version was more like a Salad a la Nicoise because it included some untraditional ingredients and left some the staple ingredients out.

I had to go shopping to pick up a few of the ingredients but it was nice to take a trip with the recipe in mind. To make the salad I blanched some green beans and steamed a small red potato in the microwave. I cut up the green beans and the potato and tossed them in a vinaigrette of olive oil, grainy mustard,lemon juice, balsamic vinegar and fresh chopped chives. I served this mixture over a bed of greens and topped it with: grape tomatoes, half a hard boiled egg, and ton of parsley and my secret favorite: anchovies with capers.

A traditional Salad Nicoise has tuna and olives. Usually it does not contain any starch ie. potatoes. Sometimes it isn't even served over lettuce.

For dessert I had a chobani yogurt that I picked up while shopping with sliced strawberries and some vanilla extract. It was soooo good and creamy. I'll definitely be buying this brand again.

Monday, April 21, 2008

After a hectic week of babysitting I had really been looking forward to going grocery shopping all week. Despite the fact that it is nearly an hour a way I LOVE going to Whole Foods. The Whole Foods I go to is right next door to what my friends call the Faraway Trader Joes as opposed to the Trader Joes near our school. It's also the only grocery store in the area that sells wine and alcohol. I bought some of my favorites at Whole Foods: Vanilla Hempmilk, Honey Roasted Peanut Butter, and Whipped Cottage Cheese. One of the best purchases I made were Whole Foods brand veggie chips. I think they've been featured on Jenna's blog and they are SO GOOD. Not really good for you but they're like crack. I have to force myself to walk away from them and stop eating.

Whenever I go to Whole Foods I have to get the salad bar and Sunday was no exception. It's great to be able to try a little bit of so many different things.

Anna got sushi and I was jealous. Luckily she let me have one.

Anna also wanted me to take a picture of her favorite seltzer water: Adirondack Cranberry Lime. It really is good and she drinks a lot of it. They should sponsor her: Adirondack the official beverage of Anna.

After snacking on a million veggie chips eventually I was hungry for dinner. I had a delicious fresh salad and a few slices of cheese I bought at the store. It was my first time trying to Taleggio and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's creamy but still substantial and flavorful.

With my salad I had some hummus that I homemade over the weekend. It doesn't look like much but I don't think I'll be going back to store bought hummus again.Tomorrow I'm planning on making some red lentil soup and doing a cookbook review. See you then!

Thursday, April 17, 2008

On Monday night I made Lindsay's now famous Carrot Cake Cupcakes from the Happy Herbivore blog. I made them for a party in honor of my friend, Maggie who recently finished and received highest honors on her senior honors thesis!!!!(that deserves a lot of exclamation)

Everyone, myself included, loved the cupcakes. There were no leftovers. I cannot believe that they were vegan and also remotely healthy (no oil, though a decent amount of sugar) No one who ate them was a vegan or even a vegetarian but everyone seemed to thoroughly enjoy them.

This morning I had oat bran as I am all out of oatmeal. I prepared they oat bran as I normally do my oatmeal and added a few toasted walnuts to the top, leftover from my carrot cake cupcakes. Good but I still prefer oatmeal, though I might start eating less and less of it as the weather gets warmer.

I wanted a big substantial lunch today so that's what I made. I cooked up some Baked Cumin-Lime Tofu from Dreena Burton's Eat Drink and Be Vegan. This will be my third successful Dreena recipe. I had my tofu with a big batch of Kale Chips and a side plate with sliced cucumbers, some pita bread and the last of my baba ganoush. I feel satisfied and not full now, which is good considering I have a lot work to do this afternoon.

School and babysitting are both getting busy so their might be less posts in the next few weeks. I'm planning some excellent meals and a ton of cookbook reviews so be ready!

Sunday, April 13, 2008

So for brunch this morning I made baked oatmeal but just as I was pulling it out of the oven my roommates woke up and asked me if I wanted to go out for breakfast and I simply could not resist. Breakfast was at the Parkway Diner, our usual haunt. Usually I'm an egg white veggie omelet kind of gal but yesterday I was feeling crazy and crazy hungry, so I went for the Parkway Special two eggs, toast and homefries. Not gonna lie it was a little disappointing, I got the eggs poached but didn't want them over the toast so they came in a little dish, which would've been okay but they left water from the poaching in the dish. The homefries at this place are usually crazy but they were kind of boring and undercooked yesterday.After brunch I had to go to work. When I got back from work I made Palak Soyabina Panira from Eat Drink and Be Vegan. It was really good, though I am not sure that I would make it again. Palak Paneer is one of my favorite Indian Dishes but I know that the fried cheese (paneer) and the creamy spinach is pretty calorie laden. The vegan version subbed tofu for the cheese and left the creamy component completely out of the equation. Dreena's Palak was good but not quite rich or hearty enough to be a full meal. She does recommend serving it with several of her side dishes so I'm sure that Dreena meant for it to be more like one component of a meal rather than a meal in and of itself.For desert I had a big portion of baked oatmeal warmed with a little almond milk and brown sugar.

Saturday, April 12, 2008

So yesterday was pretty boring food-wise, though lunch was interesting. I finally made those kale chips everyone has been raving about. They were so good. I just baked them up on a baking sheet with a drizzle of olive oil and garlic salt at 375 for about 12 minutes. I also had cut up carrots, cucumbers, and pita bread with baba ganoush and salsa. Light and tasty!

I went to the wine tasting last night, but didn't take any pictures. I had my camera but it didn't seem appropriate. Not to mention we were the youngest people there and it would have just made that fact that much more apparent if we were snapping pictures everywhere.

I tried sooo many wines. Some I loved, some I hated. I bought one bottle, a Guelbenzu Vierlas 2002, an Argentinian? red wine, that I really enjoyed. I'm also getting a little obsessed with Gary Vaynerchuks wine vlog on tv.winelibrary.com. He's so irritating at first but then it's like crack and you realized you've watched two hours worth of blogs.

This morning I wanted a BIG hearty breakfast so I made pancakes using Maple Grove Farm Buttermilk and Honey Pancake Mix with bananas. I topped them with a little butter and honey. I should have pancakes more often I forget how much I like them.